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It has been increasingly evident that significant numbers of students are profoundly dissatisfied with the status quo, on as well as off the campus, and many of them are ready to use force and violence to change it. In some instances student activists want more participation in decision making, and in others they seek complete control. The organized black students generally use power tactics to gain concessions for themselves rather than to effect drastic alterations in college structure and function. Despite the ends sought by these various groups and although most of them use confrontation tactics, some of the protest reflects legitimate concerns. Instead of adopting an authoritarian posture, it would seem more sensible to acknowledge the presence of student activists, keep their protest within reasonable bounds, and take a hard look at what forms of "participatory democracy" are compatible with the institution's central purpose. For whatever the nature and purposes of the university may be, order on the campus is a necessity, and responsibility for maintaining it must be shared by all members of the campus community. Institutions should be prepared to make functional and structural changes, but it should be emphasized that they exist to serve the larger society rather than to further demands of the moment on their campuses. The kind and degree of participation should depend upon individual capability and performance. (WM)

Looking back at what has been happening ON university campuses since 1963, one may become concerned about what may happen TO the institutions involved. There is nothing immutable or sacrosanct about the way colleges and universities are organized and operated, but they must be able to resist pressures for changes that would threaten their integrity and distinction as centers of higher learning. The common theory that the university is a social microcosm is erroneous. It is a specialized community and should not be viewed as a stage for partisan politics or be expected to reflect the interests of each of its members. It is necessary to protect the university from becoming an agency for offsetting inadequacies that stem from other sources such as poverty, criminality, unemployment, and urban blight, for while it provides distinctive functions in its services to society, it cannot be expected to direct its attention to all social problems. Neither can it survive as a battleground for organized disruptions, collective bargaining and other tactics, nor as a haven for escapist students and overly permissive young faculty. Where reform is needed, dialogue should replace negotiation between the parties concerned, for the traditional testing of ideas must not degenerate into a conflict which destroys academic freedom. If academic freedom is to be preserved, student duties must be considered along with student rights, and responsibilities kept in balance with privileges. (WM)

David Holmes’s Where the Sacred and Secular Harmonize asks readers to attend to the frequently overlooked rhetoric of key speakers during the 1963 Birmingham mass meetings that contributed to the s...

Noting that institutional trustees have less authority as a result of the collectivistic trend, the author forcasts continued growth of statewide higher education agencies and discusses the problems of statewide coordination. He suggests ways in which local boards should cooperate with state agencies to bring about improvement in governance. (JT)

Since 1965, there has been a growing incidence of student protests and campus disorder. Some difficulties stem from mistaken notions of the functions and purposes of a university, one of which is that a university is an arena in which members of the academic community line up as adversaries. Maintenance of the status quo is not the answer, for real reforms are needed. The university's size, increased outside involvements, heterogeneity, enhanced importance, enmeshment in processes of rapid social change all enlarge the problems of campus freedom and order. Many institutions must face up to the need for more formalized regulations than they once required because contract rather than status has come to establish many of our standards of social behavior. Governance of higher education will probably become more legalistic than it has been in the past; and to prevent outside authority from dictating campus life, members of the academic community will have to reconsider how best to govern themselves. At Brown University, an Advisory Committee on Student Conduct concluded after an in-depth study that the common interest can best be served through a partnership process with students participating in a social system they help to create and enforce. Such studies should be initiated and their recommendations implemented at other institutions. Although membership in the academic community carries special rights and obligations, it does not exempt individuals from legal and moral standards prevailing in the larger community. (JS)

Discusses five basic questions that colleges and universities should answer before reforming their systems of governance: "Who now decides what? Which facets of governance are sources of dissatisfaction, and for whom? What changes are being proposed, and why? How can their feasibility and desirability be assessed? What are the implications of proposed changes? (Author/WM)

Four aspects of the university that are essential to its effective functioning. (Editor)

This paper, delivered by the president of the American Council on Education at the First U.S. Conference on Libraries and Information Science in Higher Education (Tokyo, Japan, Mary 12, 1969), explores the interrelations between libraries and educational institutions. (JB)

The author sees higher education as a battleground between prevailing meritocracy and forces of egalitarianism in "what is at best a competition and at worst a conflict. Focuses on the "growing contradiction of the guiding principles behind educational endeavor, weights the charges of the adversaries, and suggests the possible outcome. (Author)

Author suggests a combination of the best of the old and new educational dogmas for the improvement of the educational system. (HS)

The first and only time I ever heard Martin Luther King speak I was a college undergraduate. It was in the early sixties and I sat mesmerized in the upper tier of what was then the Charlotte (North...

Remarks made at the annual meeting of the American Council on Education (51st, Denver, Oct. 1968).